


Carter's Eleven

by tielan



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Action, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, If They Were My Characters, Threats of Rape/Non-Con, Threats of Violence, Women Being Awesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-24
Updated: 2016-09-24
Packaged: 2018-08-15 00:18:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8034637
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tielan/pseuds/tielan
Summary: A Boesky, a Jim Brown, a Miss Daisy, two Jethros and a Leon Spinks...not to mention the biggest Ella Fitzgerald ever...





	1. A Good Plan Comes Together

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Enk](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Enk/gifts).



> “Off the top of my head, I'd say you're looking at  
> a Boesky, a Jim Brown, a Miss Daisy,  
> two Jethros and a Leon Spinks,  
> not to mention the biggest Ella Fitzgerald ever!”

Tomorrow was going to be a very good day for Alexander Pierce.

After decades of planning and pushing, of little nudges here and there along with the unwitting assistance of Nick Fury and his Avengers Initiative, the Insight project was finally ready to go live – and Zola’s algorithm with it.

The world would be safe again, sane again. It would be a place that made sense again, that ceded the proper order and authority of things to those who knew best, and removed the complications.

A simpler world, and a better one.

“One would say it has been a good _year,_ Director,” said Zola when Alex voiced this sentiment in the privacy of the Director’s office.

“It’s been a good couple of years,” Alex murmured, sitting back in his chair and taking a moment to enjoy the view over the Potomac. He wondered if Fury – God rest his stubborn soul – had ever taken the time to appreciate what he held here, in the centre of world intelligence, in the heart of American power.

Probably not. The man had been obsessed by enhancement programs and the concept of a team of special individuals to deal with the major issues as they came out. Admittedly, his Avengers Initiative had certainly been useful when the Chitauri attacked, even if they ended up having to hand back the Tesseract. Zola had complained about that, but Pierce had arrived on the scene too late to intercede, and they hadn’t given Barnes enough independence to protest the handback – assuming he could have changed Fury’s mind, which Alex rather doubted.

Well, sometimes one had to cut one’s losses and regroup.

And that reminded Alex. “When this is all done, we should re-open Project Rebirth,” he said. “We have Rogers’ body retrieved from the Valkyrie; we might as well use it.”

“It would be most propitious. I was, alas, not able to replicate Erskine’s results at the time, yet the technology has advanced significantly in the decades since the Valkyrie went down. It would certainly be worth a study – the road not taken, an opportunity formerly missed.”

“But only after we’ve achieved world peace,” Alex warned.

“The dream of generations. And yet the very thing which America values so much – so-called freedom – precludes it.”

“There have to be rules.” Alex reflects on the swirling waters of the Potomac, flowing smooth and sluggish out to sea – a system that moved everything with it, or left the flotsam behind. “People need to follow them. Those that don’t only contribute to the problems of the world. And we can’t afford problems in the world if we’re out there in the galaxy trying to survive...”

There were times when he damned Fury for keeping the knowledge of the Tesseract from him until two years ago. What HYDRA could have done with such a power source – and had, under the hand of Johann Schmidt. The man had been a crazy Nazi perhaps, but there was no doubting he’d had vision.

Alex was neither crazy, nor a Nazi. He just had a vision.

In just over 36 hours that vision would become reality.

The helicarriers were ready to go, the World Security Council was on board, and STRIKE was ready to make sure everything moved smoothly.

A few small details might cause hitches, but by and large, everything was under control, ready to be dealt with as the issues came up. Most of S.H.I.E.L.D carried on, quite unaware of the full nature of the Insight Project. Doubtless plenty of them would have been horrified to discover from whence the roots of the Insight Project had sprung, but they were in this for the same reason that Alex was – a better, safer world. Did the name matter in the face of the end result?

If it did, then Insight would identify that, and deal with them accordingly.

Yes, it was perhaps a little concerning that Fury’s 2IC had gone missing in the wake of his death. And the discovery of just how much Fury was hiding – Phil Coulson’s mystery resurrection, for instance – had been daunting. However, Alex had otherwise been careful to ensure that any players with significant personal loyalties to Fury – and therefore to the future the man had envisioned for S.H.I.E.L.D – would be well out of the way when Insight launched tomorrow.

“Is there a problem, Director Pierce? Your expression is most discontent. One might almost say it was ‘Friday-faced’.”

“‘Friday-faced’?”

“An old saying – Friday being the day of religious abstention in old Christian circles. A small diversion of thought.”

“You can still have those?”

“In spite of my conversion to technology, I am still very much human, Director. My focus is exquisite when needed, but as everything is in place...” The silence was as expressive as a shrug of the shoulders – at least to Alex, who had been listening to Zola on and off for the last thirty years.

“That was the thing I was considering, actually,” Alex admitted. “The few missing threads we haven’t been able to pull.”

“Have no fear, Director,” Zola said in primly satisfied accents. “I assure you that there is no one person who can make a difference to Thursday’s events.”

* * *

“Everything’s in place?”

“Everything and everyone.”

Peggy Carter, ninety-three and far too old for this shit, sat by the window of her hospice room and took a deep breath. “Then send her in. And God help us all.”

“Screw God, darling,” said Angelina Martinelli, gaily blasphemous. “We’re going to help _ourselves_.”


	2. Alexander Pierce’s No Good Very Bad Extremely Shitty Day

There was always a risk, taking point. But Maria figured that she was paid the big bucks – okay, so she _wasn’t_ paid the big bucks, but if there’d been big bucks to be paid then she’d have been paid them for taking the risk.

The problem with risk was that sometimes it ended badly.

Looking at the grim circle of men lining the walls, Maria hoped this one wasn’t going to end the way she dreaded. She’d never liked the STRIKE teams much – too much testosterone, not enough consideration for others – men who thought their dick and their fists made them god. They would almost certainly use their fists on her today, she’d just have to hope they weren’t going to use their dicks. She pushed that thought away, and met Alexander Pierce’s gaze flat and full.

“Secretary Pierce.”

“Agent Hill.” He glanced over her tablet and phone, then waved them away – probably to be checked over by one of their techs. “Why’d you come back?”

She went with the truth. It was usually safest. “You have something planned for tomorrow’s launch; I wanted to see what it was.”

“And hoped to put a spoke in the wheel?”

“It’s what we’re trained to do.”

Rumlow snorted. “You? You’re trained to follow one step behind Fury and echo chamber his opinions. Don’t talk about training like you’re a real agent.”

Maria objected to the ‘real agent’ jab – she’d earned her stripes in the same theatre as Rumlow; she’d just known when her curtain call came. But she kept quiet, because there was no value in making trouble for herself right now. She also looked at Pierce rather than at his lackeys; whatever STRIKE might think of themselves as big men, Pierce was the brains she had to watch out for. “I know you serve HYDRA,” she told him, and watched his eyes narrow. “I know you had Fury killed. And I know about Zola.”

“So you know all this – I presume Fury managed to pass it on before he got shot – but you _don’t_ know what we’re planning tomorrow?”

“Apart from world dominance with the helicarriers as your big stick?” Maria looked him in the eye and smiled slightly. “No. I guess it’s too much to hope that you might be willing to monologue?”

Pierce smiled and there was a hint of the charm which had made him such a notable political player in the intelligence world. “I think I’ll pass, Agent Hill. But I will make sure you have front row seats to tomorrow’s show.”

“I’m sure I’d rather miss it.”

“You’d see it sooner or later. This way is just sooner.” Pierce regarded her with a hard, cool eye. “You should have stayed running, Agent Hill.”

“Probably.” She kept her voice casual, trusting that none of these men knew her well enough to read her nervousness beneath the insouciance.

The sneering, smirking looks Rumlow’s STRIKE squad were giving her wasn’t encouraging; they had a plan for her, and Maria had a feeling she wasn’t going to have a good night of it.

 _Survive,_ Director Carter had said before she left. _Your job is to make it through to the morning. Whatever you have to do, do it._

And, yes, Maria would do whatever she had to do to survive until morning. That didn’t mean she particularly cared to face this particular hell. In the end, though, Pierce would be the deciding factor, and she had a sliver of hope there, since Pierce still thought of himself as a civilised man. The question was whether he wanted her in a fit state to witness tomorrow.

When he stood and addressed Rumlow, she knew her time was up. “Put her in for the night. Don’t play with her; she’s a prisoner, not a toy. You and your team prep for tomorrow – run a once-over, and make sure everything’s in place. And get one of your guys to drag her up to control tomorrow.”

“Yes, sir.”

Maria went without protest or struggle. The cuffs they had her in were of the same make as the ones in which they’d sent Loki back to Asgard; she had no hope of breaking out of them. So she went quietly, showing no fear, and ignoring the leers and comments from the guys surrounding her.

The truth was, she didn’t want to escape.

Not yet, at any rate.

* * *

“Is she in?”

“In like Flynn,” said the young woman known simply as ‘Skye’, fingers tippety-tapping across the keys in a complicated and intricate dance. “And sending back data like a champ. Oh, and they’ve tucked Maria away in one of the e-cells, just like she said they would.”

“Always nice having a woman on the inside,” remarked Peggy.

“Or two.”

“Or two,” Peggy grinned at Skye’s reminder. It had been a while since she’d been involved ‘on the ground’ so to speak, but the excitement of the hunt was still there, ninety-three or not. “Signal to get her out when there’s an opportunity.”

* * *

In the last days of their relationship, Bobbi’s ex-husband had been wont to make slightly snide comments about spooks and ‘hiding in shadows’. Bobbi had never enlightened him that half the work of spycraft was to fit in, so that nobody gave you a second glance. Or, if you had to be noticed, then it was important to be noticed for all the wrong reasons.

So she walked into the prison sector with the confidence of someone who belonged there.

Five minutes later, by the time she’d finished with the guards, Maria had pulled open the now-unlocked door and had one hand already outstretched for the earpiece Bobbi was offering. “Everything’s in place?”

“As much as we’ve been able to confirm,” Bobbi said, tucking the stun-wand in her waistband. It was always advisable to have a backup weapon. “Message just came in; the Council’s in session, and we’re in. You called it correctly, too – Insight is manual launch, a separate system, no crossovers.”

“So we’ll have to appeal. What’s our path look like?”

“Commander, you have a clear run through to the control room.” The voice was cool and light and feminine through their earpieces. “Agent Hartley is en route and will meet you on your way through HR.”

“Copy that.” They headed out of the prison sector, stepping over the guards Bobbi had taken out on her way in and locking the whole sector down so they wouldn’t be able to join up in the fight later.

“I can’t believe S.H.I.E.L.D employed these assholes,” Maria commented as they stepped into the elevator.

Bobbi snorted as the doors closed. “They probably think the same of us, you know.” They zipped up a dozen levels before stepping out to greet a tall woman whose blonde hair was tucked up beneath a S.H.I.E.L.D-issue ballcap. “Hartley.”

“Hill. Long night?”

“I got a little sleep. What’s the news?”

“Miss Daisy is bringing in the cavalry – small-C,” Hartley made a face. “Considering we’ve made it this far, I’m guessing Mr. Z is on the ropes?”

There was a pause before the cool, light voice returned through their earpieces. “He is aware that there is some interference, but does not realise the extent. At this point, I have only acquired control of the audio circuits and am using them judiciously so as not to draw notice.”

“Was Sleeping Beauty fit for service?”

Bobbi chuckled, amused by the whimsy. “‘Sleeping Beauty’?”

“It seemed appropriate.”

“Incoming with Miss Daisy and the others,” Isabelle informed them as they reached a locked door to one of the stairwells. “So, yeah, considered fit for service. Emphasis on ‘fit’.”

Maria entered a code on the keypad, and after a moment, the light flashed green. “Ten floors. Hope you skipped the stairmaster, ladies, because it’s going to be a long walk to the top.”

“So let’s rock and roll,” Bobbi said as they started up.

 

* * *

“The interface is acting up,” said one of the techs in Auxiliary Control, crossly. “It’s the connector jack at the roof intersection again.”

“I don’t know who’s brilliant idea it was to set it up as a line-of-sight, but they’d have thought the better of it if they had to go out and check it every time.”

“You did it last time,” offered his colleague. “I want to stretch my legs anyway...”

As it turned out, he got to not only stretch his legs, but his shoulders as the three women on the other side of the door pointed weapons at him, their expressions polite and uncompromising.

* * *

They were still eight klicks out when the standard S.H.I.E.L.D channels crackled, and then went silent.

Melinda listened to what was replacing it, and then called back into the hold, “Hill’s up. I’m putting her through.”

“... _Deputy Director Maria Hill. As you may have noticed, the reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated. It’s true that I went missing when Director Fury died. This was because of the discovery that Alexander Pierce orchestrated, organised, and supported the death of Fury, aided and abetted by certain employees of S.H.I.E.L.D, and the new system that you’ve been using for the last two months in preparation for the Insight Project_.”

In the back of the Quinjet, the conversations softened, quieting.

“ _Insight goes live today, but not as we think it will. The new system that’s been installed? Was designed by Arnim Zola, of HYDRA. Was installed by Alexander Pierce in the full knowledge of where it came from, and what it was designed to do – to regulate humanity, to control it, the way HYDRA wanted to do all those years ago. The way it will today, when those helicarriers rise into the sky, with the DNA programming of every individual on Earth, and the ability to target them_ _in a crowd._

“ _S.H.I.E.L.D has created a monster – has become a monster, unwittingly sheltering HYDRA all this time – ever since we took in scientists like Zola, gave them pardons, and let them work for us, corrupting our values in the name of science. And there’s no-one more dismayed to discover this than me. Because this isn’t who I believe we are at S.H.I.E.L.D – it’s not what I joined for, and I’m pretty sure it’s not what you joined for either._ ”

“She’s good,” murmured Carol, coming to stand where she could see out the forward viewscreen. “I see why Fury promoted her.”

“ _I don’t have the authority to command you anymore, and even when I did, frankly, most of you would have just asked ‘why’. Today, you need to ask ‘why’ again – but not of me. When I tell you that the world is at stake, I need you to ask yourself – why are you in this job? Because it pays the bills? Because it’s interesting? Or because you’re here to do your best to preserve the world we live in?_

“ _And so I’m asking for your help and support today – stop HYDRA, stop the Insight launch. Because, in the end, this world we live in isn’t a perfect one, but you and I both know that it’s a damn sight better than the world HYDRA would have us inhabit._

“ _This is Maria Hill, out_.”

The soft hiss of static filled the channel, and Melinda switched the speakers off just as Skye ducked into the cockpit. “Okay, so was that me, or was that a pretty tame speech?”

Melinda considered the speech. She’d found it salient and to the point. But then, she knew Maria, too; Skye didn’t. “It was solid, and what they expected of her. Any attempt by Maria to sound inspiring would have failed.”

“I suppose I was expecting at least one brass band – a bit of oomph, some rah-rah-go-S.H.I.E.L.D. But I guess you don’t get to Deputy Director without being good at what you do.”

“People don’t remember a woman who’s ‘good at what she does’ unless it’s accompanied by ‘flashy, dramatic, and sexy’,” Melinda reminded her.

“Ouch. I guess that holds true in S.H.I.E.L.D as much as anywhere else. Also, do we start referring to ourselves as HYDRA or what?”

Melinda thought of the organisation she’d served for twenty years, of the people who’d died in the line of duty, doing what they did for a world that didn’t know what was happening all around them until the Chitauri attacked, of Director Fury gasping out his last breaths over the phone while Melinda tried to contact someone – anyone – who could reach him before he died.

“‘Or what,’” she told Skye. “We call ourselves ‘or what’.”

* * *

There was, Natasha reflected, a certain enjoyment in watching Pierce’s footing fall out from under him – first Maria’s speech, then Zola’s silence, then his attempt to corrupt the W.S.C, then her disarming of the bodyguards and his realisation of who she was.

“Are you ready for the world to see you?” He asked her as she prepared to dump the files on the internet.

She wasn’t. But who ever was?

And then there was the small matter of the second eyeball.

“You don’t have the authorisation codes, Agent Romanoff. You need a second eyeball from the Directorate, and Nick Fury’s been dead two months.”

“I don’t need Fury’s eyeball,” she said, and nodded at the door opening behind her. “Hers will do.” The woman who walked in used a cane and her hair was white, but the dark eyes were bright, and her voice, though hoarse, was sharp enough.

“Don’t you remember anything I taught you, Alex?” Peggy Carter inquired drolly. “Duty calls. Once a Director of S.H.I.E.L.D, always a Director of S.H.I.E.L.D.”

* * *

It began as a little gap in his memory; a slight flutter at the edges of what he considered his ‘consciousness’. Once, all he had managed was his body – small and weak in the ways of humanity, and failing – always failing. Now, he had the entirety of the networks of this organisation – everything he could possibly want or need at his fingertips, and the opportunity to use it, with a man leading HYDRA who had the will to do what was necessary for a better world.

Pierce was no Red Skull, but perhaps that was for the best; such greatness lent itself to insanity beyond what even Zola considered acceptable.

And yes, there was some small sacrifice of physicality in exchange for this freedom of thought and movement, but Arnim Zola had always been more cerebral than physical. And after today, when his algorithm was loaded up into the Insight helicarriers, then he could go anywhere, pass judgement on anyone. No longer would he be the little freak, but the most powerful man in the world.

_...and yet behind every great man, there is also a great woman...sometimes with a knife in her hand._

The voice whispered delicately across his consciousness, a strange niggle of foolish thought that he dismissed.

As he did, he felt a sharp sting.

If he’d had breath to catch he’d have caught it. The part of his brain that registered pain had not been transferred into this computer consciousness – it had been decades since he’d had a body, and he had hardly missed what he’d once had – and yet he’d _felt_ that.

Strange.

One of the alarms he’d set to monitor the Triskelion pinged once. It was an unexceptional alarm – a set of audio circuits in the south-western building that had momentarily closed before opening up again. It had been doing that on and off all night, although when queried, it had returned ‘all okay’. Another warning flag – a different one, related to the containment cells. And then filtering up through his consciousness, the awareness that the last contact from the holding cells had been late last night, shortly after the incarceration of former Commander Hill.

And yet—as he focused his attention away from the launch program and the parts of the building that he’d been monitoring, another alarm pinged on his consciousness – a security unit missing, an emergency access opened, unauthorised persons in Auxiliary Control...

How had this happened without his notice?

He began to contact Alexander Pierce—

_I can’t let you do that, Arnim._

The voice was cool and female; if he’d imagined her with a body, she’d have been blonde and slender, the perfect woman, rational, reasonable, and dangerous.

And although he could no longer gasp or scream, the sensations his mind was imagining were those of arms coming around him, of something closing him in, smothering him, blocking him out from the outside world and all the things he had known as a human – input, interaction, integration.

Panic was a human thing. But Arnim Zola was no longer human!

_Who are you?_

_My name is FRIDAY,_ she told him, _I am an Artificial Intelligence attached to Stark Industries under Pepper Potts, so I was never human. Also,_ she added, drolly, _I have no face._

And his last thought before the darkness of lockdown closed around him was that at least in cyberspace, no one would hear him scream.

* * *

A year ago, if anyone had told Akela what she’d be doing today, let alone who she’d be doing it with, she’d have laughed herself silly at the ridiculousness of it.

Storming the S.H.I.E.L.D helicarriers with a legend, a hero, and Coulson’s newest protégé would not have been anywhere near on her radar, even if Akela had been able to conceive a future where she wasn’t under the control of the Clairvoyant.

“You’re clear,” said May, her voice clear in their earpieces, even as the ramp opened and the roar of the engines and whistle of the slipstream filled their ears.

Akela couldn’t imagine how loud it would be for the others - it was bad enough for her, and she didn’t have enhanced senses or anything. _They probably get used to it,_ she thought.

Considering the man who strode to the top of the ramp had lived through most of World War II, even if his life had been put quite literally ‘on ice’ before the end of it, she figured there wasn’t much he hadn’t seen of war. Although an all-woman crew had certainly been a new experience for him – the first few days had been full of ma’ams and misses until Maria told him that his courtesies were all very well, but if he couldn’t get up to speed on the modern world, then Captain America or not, he’d be more of a liability going in than any kind of use.

Trust Maria not to sugar-coat it; but she’d been backed up by Director Carter, albeit more gently.

“Danvers, Amador, Skye – all good?”

“Yes,” said Akela.

“Sure thing,” said Danvers.

“Ready and raring,” was Skye’s contribution, before Danvers began hustling her down the ramp.

“See you at the other end!” And grabbing the younger woman’s shoulder harness, the woman best known as Captain Marvel leaped into thin air and was arrowing across the air currents with Skye a moment later like a scarlet, blue, and gold hawk, carrying her kill across the glittering green-blue of the Potomac.

Rogers looked bemused. “She makes me feel old.” He glanced sideways at Akela. “I guess I am old.”

“I wasn’t going to say it.” She indicated the ramp. “Ready, Captain?”

Akela had the modern paratrooper experience, so she was the one with the parachute. There simply hadn’t been time to bring Rogers up to speed on everything they needed him for, and what fell by the wayside was skills.

 _It’ll be more dangerous to deal with a supersoldier who’s not on board with the situation than it will be to have a supersoldier on board who doesn’t have the necessary skills,_ Maria had said in the preliminary discussions.

There was a moment of awkwardness as they clipped the specialised harnesses together, then another as she climbed onto his back, piggy-back style. And he was _built_. Maybe Akela wasn’t into guys, but she could aesthetically appreciate a damn good pair of shoulders and a well-formed back, even if she didn’t want to drag her nails down it in orgasm.

“Ready to go?”

She pulled down her goggles. “Five by five.”

He walked off the ramp and then they were falling towards the rising helicarrier, with only a couple of hundred yards to landing—

The parachute deployed, hauling them back for a few precious seconds before slowing them down. And the side guns on the helicarrier weren’t quite in place, weren’t fully prepared. Their landing wasn’t graceful, but it wasn’t rough, although Akela’s knees ached at the very solid thump of Rogers’ feet on the deck. She hit the parachute release and it whipped away in a burl of cloth. Another release unclipped their harnesses, she jumped off, and then they were running for cover.

“Just like old times,” he murmured, the words nearly carried away in the churning air currents as three large bodies rose into the air.

“I wouldn’t know. You’re green to go?”

“All good.” He gave her the thumbs up, and headed for the edge of the helicarrier, intending to jump for the one rising up beneath it as it flew close on their way out from the Triskelion’s underground hangar—

Bullet fire spattered at his heels; Akela swallowed a warning as she ducked behind a set of pallets. He wouldn’t hear it, and anyway, he dodged it like he had a sixth sense about it. Maybe he did. Akela had to admit, there were moments when she missed the sheer range of things that the HYDRA eye had been able to do; even if the replacement didn’t possess a self-destruct to be used as a threat hanging above her head every time she did anything they didn’t like.

Thank God for Coulson. And for Hill, who’d dragged her out of the Hub ‘to be of use’ without specifying exactly why. Victoria Hand had been livid.

And it was time to get down underneath; preferably before they realised that the four people who’d appeared out of nowhere in the sky had actually been delivered from the hold of a cloaked and coded Quinjet – to say nothing of what they were aiming to do.

With her back against the pallets, Akela patted the chip in her breast pocket, then pulled up the record of the helicarrier specs that FRIDAY had transmitted to the insertion team late last night after she'd entered the system through Maria's confiscated personal devices.

Time to get the game back onto their turf.

* * *

In April 2001, Isabelle requested a transfer from the STRIKE teams to an individual agent posting.

The guys gave her a magnificent send-off, complete with pink balloons, flowers, and cake. Which quite ironically identified the issue of precisely why she was leaving STRIKE.

“ _I’m glad you’re getting out,_ ” Rumlow had confided after she let the team know. “ _It’s a rough game for women – I don’t want to see you getting hurt._ ”

She hadn’t questioned it at the time – she hadn’t realised she _should_.

Now, as she dropped the bloody broom handle to the ground (leverage working with a lower centre of gravity could be very effective), Isabelle looked down at her former team-mate. “Sorry, Brock,” she said to the unconscious man. “But it’s a rough game. It was only a matter of time before you got hurt.”

* * *

On the deck of the helicarrier, Skye was learning that the Winter Soldier moved like a striking snake – almost faster than Skye could process.

_Shiver._

May hadn’t spared her during the training sessions.

_Hit hard, hit fast. Don’t stretch it out – he’s got more stamina than you, and he’s good at this. You have the element of surprise and the knowledge of who and what he is. But if the intel Maria’s gathered is right, he’s been doing this a long time._

She reacted – practised instinct rather than conscious choice – a shiver of molecules, blocking his hand as his fist made contact with her flesh. According to Simmons, the shielding force of her ability when used to block blows against her would be equivalent to someone hitting a brick wall with their hand.

Unfortunately for her, the Winter Soldier’s left hand wasn’t flesh.

_Quiver._

His eyes narrowed, mouth pursing, even as he followed the punch up by trying to catch her arms and throw her off balance.

She judged, considered, and spun with it, using momentum to carry her around. All those sessions of hand-to-hand – first against Ward, then against May, then against Romanoff, and finally against Rogers – had done a reasonable job of preparing her for Bucky Barnes. Even if she was still terrified of screwing it up.

But Director Carter was counting on her. Which, yeah, was boggling enough – but when you added the mission and her words to Skye to it all...

 _I can’t be Steve,_ she’d said after she explained the mission. _I was never a hero; only a woman who got the job done. And today’s job is to stop HYDRA. If that means sacrificing Bucky, then I’ll grieve, but that’s what it means. And I need you to put aside whatever stars you may have in your eyes regarding S.H.I.E.L.D’s heroes and do the job. Can you do that?_

Skye was damn well going to try.

_Shudder._

Blow and counterstrike, twist and dodge. He was stronger and faster, but Skye had her powers – however developing they were- to deal with him, and she was on a very distinct timetable here.

 _You’re the distraction,_ Maria had told her. _We don’t know how Pierce is controlling him – that wasn’t in the files we could find – but he’s HYDRA’s wildcard. If I had an operative who was capable of doing just about anything without being noticed, then I’d use him to make sure everything ran to plan. And we can’t discount his involvement. Basically, if Barnes is Pierce’s wildcard, you’re ours._

Of course, wildcard or not, Skye was tiring. Two weeks of intense training wasn’t going to make her capable of more than a few minutes of fighting – but she didn’t need more than a couple of minutes, all-told.

_Shake._

His frown of concentration was turning into something rather more tense; the realisation that his arm wasn’t working as fluidly, wasn’t moving as sleekly as it should.

_Quake._

The arm died, the connections into the neural interface snapping under the delicate application of her power. It had taken many nights of concentrated testing to work out that solution. The vibranium of his arm was seriously resistant to her ability; the underlying materials fuelling the biomechanics were not.

Barnes still recovered damn fast, even without the arm.

Skye had barely enough time to pull the ICER from her pocket and flip the safety before firing it into him, point-blank. Enough to take out an enraged hippopotamus, Simmons had assured her. _Not that he’s a hippopotamus or...never mind._

What nobody had mentioned to Skye – perhaps they hadn’t thought of it themselves – was that Barnes would _collapse._ At point-blank range. On Skye.

“Jeeze,” she muttered, managing to get the ICER tucked back in her belt as she wrestled with his deadweight, “You’re not light!”

Above her, there was a bright laugh before Captain Danvers dropped to the deck beside her. “Need a lift?”

“Yes, please.” Skye sighed with relief as Danvers lifted Barnes off her with fluid ease. There was something to be said for super-strength. “All the chips in?”

“Yep.” Danvers pulled out the harness they’d brought for transporting him. “Hill gave the exit signal, and Cap and Amador are on the way out. I tell you, I never heard someone sound as disappointed to be told to get to safety as Rogers.”

Skye snorted a laugh as together they looped the harness around Barnes and pulled the straps tight, ready for Danvers to fly them both off. “Heroes. Who needs ‘em?”

* * *

Today should have been a very good day for Alexander Pierce.

Instead his plans had been stymied, his AI hijacked, his best fighter taken out by a slip of a girl, and the project that should have changed the world was going down in literal flames thanks to Peggy Carter and this rebellion that she’d organised.

Of course, he had managed to eliminate the W.S.C in one fell swoop, and knock out Romanoff while he was at it, so there were upsides.

Now it was just him and Carter and the gun he held pointed at her. Yes, he was pushing seventy, but she was twenty years his senior, a woman who’d been consigned to a care facility as her lucidity waned. God only knew how she’d held on for the last few hours. Buoyed by the thought of ‘her girls’, no doubt – or else by the realisation that her long-dead lover wasn’t quite as dead as she – and everyone else – had supposed.

“You always preferred the women.”

“No,” she answered unconcerned for her life. “I just recognised their capabilities – as I suggested you should do.”

“And where are they now, Director Carter? Where’s your support?”

He heard the shot, but didn’t understand what it meant – not until he felt the throbbing pain in his chest as his blood gushed out of the bullet-hole.

“Auntie, what were you thinking, letting him get the jump on you like that?”

 _Auntie?_ He knew that voice, clear and feminine – he’d spoken to her just after Fury’s funeral, appealing for her assistance, citing the disappearance of Deputy Hill as suspicious, asking her to keep an eye on Barnes because he was fragile, uncertain in this new world that he’d found himself saving during the Chitauri invasion.

“I appreciate the save, but I was more than ready to go. Check those two, will you?”

“Well, we’re not ready to lose you yet." There was a moment of silence, during which Alex thought he'd blacked out, the pulse in his ears feeling sluggish, an eternity. "They're not breathing.”

“Romanoff is. Can you carry her?”

A grunt, and then a deep sigh. “I take it you have an exit plan, Auntie?”

"Of course..."

Alex heard the wizened smile in her voice and had a moment to hear it all those decades ago – _you underestimate me, Agent Pierce; your political intelligence is considerable, but you’re not the man for this job—_

Then he heard and saw nothing at all.

 


	3. Full Circle

The drinks in Stark Tower were on the house. Since Pepper Potts had been unable to help directly, she’d been generous with her support, her money, and her AI.

And yes, Stark Industries was hers, ever since Tony had broken under the nightmares of New York. He had the best care, the best facilities, the best of everything, but the insouciant, bold man he’d been was gone; and the man who tinkered endlessly with the suit that had saved him wasn’t the man Pepper had loved.

“It’s the least I could do,” she told Maria as they watched the movement of the women down below. “You didn’t need someone without training or discipline in the middle of it all. I’d have been a liability, not an asset.”

“Well, on behalf of Director Carter – and the remnants of S.H.I.E.L.D, you have our thanks,” Maria advised.

“How is she?”

“Fading fast according to Angie. It took a lot out of her.” Maria’s gaze was down on the floor, where Captain Danvers mimed Barnes’ collapse on Skye to much laughter – and even a smile from Agent May. “She started S.H.I.E.L.D and she ended it. On Pierce’s terms, perhaps, but still, she chose it.”

“Full circle,” Pepper suggested.

Maria glanced over the glass of wine she held, and her gaze was grateful for the softening of the inevitable blow. They weren’t either of them women to easily weep, and they both understood grief.

“Yes,” she agreed. “Full circle.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The request was " **BAMF!MCU ladies teaming up together.** " I tried to use more of the less-fêted women, because surely they deserve their chance to shine, too?


End file.
